Project Summary/Abstract 1 Antimicrobial resistance in enteric bacteria from retail meat in Iowa: A NARMS Retail 2 Food Surveillance Project 3 Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is a major health threat affecting the well-being of humans, 4 animals, and the environment worldwide. Robust and comprehensive surveillance systems 5 emphasizing the ?One Health? approach are necessary for effectively combatting AMR. In the 6 United States, the retail arm of the National Antimicrobial Resistance Monitoring System 7 (NARMS) under the Food and Drug Administration, Center for Veterinary Medicine (FDA- 8 CVM ) performs surveillance of AMR in select enteric bacteria (non-typhoidal Salmonella, 9 Campylobacter, Enterococcus and Escherichia coli) from retail raw meat (chicken, ground 10 turkey and beef, and pork chop) in 14 states. The NARMS program has contributed significantly 11 to monitoring the sources and trends of AMR in the food chain. To enhance the effort on 12 combating AMR, FDA has recently established a cooperative agreement program to expand the 13 NARMS surveillance network throughout the U.S. In this application, we propose to establish a 14 partnership with the NARMS and become a network laboratory for AMR surveillance in Iowa. 15 Since Iowa does not currently participate in the NARMS surveillance program, its inclusion as a 16 new site would substantially increase and strengthen the capacity and effectiveness of the 17 national surveillance program in retail food. We will obtain and process raw meat samples 18 (chicken, pork chop, ground beef, and ground turkey) from grocery stores in Iowa and culture 19 them for isolation of Salmonella, Campylobacter, E. coli and Enterococcus, and provide the 20 isolates to the FDA for surveillance purpose on a monthly basis. Our partnership will help the 21 NARMs achieve the objectives and goals of the Retail Food Surveillance Program as described 22 in the FOA PAR-16-099 ?NARMS Cooperative Agreement Program to Enhance and Strengthen 23 Antibiotic Resistance Surveillance in Retail Food Specimens (U01)?. This collaborative work 24 will significantly contribute to mitigation of AMR in the food chain and thus will improve food 25 safety and public health. 26 27 28